Page 62 of Make Me Whole

I was almost out of the foyer when the front door opened behind me. Ready for a fight in case it was Eli, I closed my fist and turned to look at the incomer.

“It’s just me,” Molly said, holding one hand and a basket of muffins in the air. “Sky said I didn’t have to knock anymore.”

I unclenched my hands and relaxed. “You don’t. I’m sorry. I was just worried it was Eli.”

She crossed herself like a catholic at mass and shivered. “Good gracious, I worry about that too. I don’t get how a sweet woman like Sky went and got hitched to a crazy-eyed nut like him.”

“Yeah, I don’t get that either, Molly. But maybe it had something to do with her being young and knocked up.”

“That will certainly do it.” She chuckled and linked her bony arm with mine as we walked to the kitchen. “The one thing that has allowed me to put the worry for Sky to the back of my mind and sleep has been—”

“Using Al as a pillow?”

She laughed and slapped my arm. “Well, yes. But also, the increase in police cars patrolling the area. Most people worry it means crime has gone up, but since I have a good alarm system—and a strong man in my bed...” She waggled her brows and continued, “I’m just glad that if Eli comes around to harass our girl, we won’t even have to bother calling the cops. They’re always around, anyway.”

We were almost in the kitchen when I stopped walking. “When has the patrolling started?”

She looked at me and shrugged. “I don’t know. I first saw police cars roaming the area around Halloween, but the frequency has gone up the past week. Maybe Sky knows more accurately.”

“She knows about it?” I asked. My forehead ached with how tightly scrunched my brows were.

Molly nodded. “Yeah. The first time I noticed them was Sunday as I was coming over for lunch. Sky opened the door for me and saw the police car drive by. She asked me if I knew about a crime spree in the area, but I said I didn’t.”

The anger that had been under the surface since the altercation with Eli boiled over. And as much as it pained me to admit it, this time, I was angry at Sky.

I walked toward the kitchen fuming, towing Molly along through our connected arms.

“Hey, jerk,” Al called from his seat at the head of the table. “Are you trying to steal my woman?”

Giggling and flipping her hair, Molly let go of me and walked toward Al. “He was just being kind. Max and I are friends, and not each other’s type.”

“Max has been out of the game so long, he doesn’t have a type anymore.”

Ignoring Al who was being dumb and the kids who were always silly, I walked around the island and to the stove where Sky was flipping pancakes. “Hi.”

She looked sideways at me. Despite the ever present tension in her eyes, her smile was almost normal. “Hi, Max.”

Behind us, Al asked Molly what she and I had been talking about when we arrived. As she told him about the police patrol, I looked deeply into Sky’s golden eyes and asked, “Did you know?”

Her face grew red, and she blinked several times as if stunned. Al told the kids to go wash their hands in the bathroom. Once they were gone, he stared at his daughter and echoed my question.

A minute passed without her answering. I was getting really antsy, but Al kept his fatherly cool. Staring at his daughter with an intense gaze, he said her full name, and I recognized the tone he used from when she was a little girl. The resolve in her shoulders sagged.

“Yes,” she whispered. “I first saw the car on Saturday.”

“How many times have you seen it since?” Al pressed.

Her chest expanded with a deep breath. She stared at me, cheeks flushed and eyes apologetic. “Every day. A cop drove by the school a few times as I waited for the kids and followed me to the grocery store yesterday. Today, I saw it drive by twice since I woke up.”

Al cursed, and Molly, finally understanding what was happening, raised her brows. As for me, I ran a hand through my hair, hoping it would ease the anger I felt at being kept in the dark by the woman with whom I was in a relationship... of sorts.

I could see her eyes begging me not to start an argument with her dad standing only a few feet away and the kids about to return to the kitchen, and I tried not to. I really did. But I was too worried and too angry to employ self-control.

“Goddammit, Skylar. You have to tell me these things. How can I protect you otherwise?”

She stole a peek at the table and shook her head. “You can’t. That’s the point. That’s why I didn’t tell you.” Her gaze moved from me to her dad. Al looked as angry as I felt, while Molly looked so worried her forehead would have wrinkled if not for all the Botox. “That’s why I didn’t tell any of you.”

“That’s bullshit,” I muttered.

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